Cartels recruit Guatemalans in Mexico drug war

ACAYUCAN, Mexico - On a balmy evening in April, five sport-utility vehicles full of gunmen roared up to the gates of the immigration detention center here.

The gunmen pointed assault rifles at the guardhouse but entered without firing a shot. They loaded up 13 Guatemalan detainees. Then, they sped off into the night.

The raid is evidence of a disturbing new trend in the U.S.-backed war against Mexico's drug cartels. The gunmen were apparently drug-cartel henchmen, and the people they freed were Central Americans who had been on their way to a cartel training camp.

Mexican traffickers are increasingly turning to Central America for reinforcements, ammunition and help from corrupt authorities there, experts say. The cartels are training Central American recruits at camps in Guatemala and Mexico, infiltrating weak Central American police forces and carving out "safe zones" in foreign countries beyond the reach of Mexican authorities.

The developments reflect a major shift in drug-smuggling patterns and show the cartels' continuing ability to evolve to avoid Mexico's U.S.-backed crackdown, which began in 2006, said Helen Mack, president of the Myrna Mack Foundation, a group that studies crime issues in Guatemala.

Three days after the April 19 raid in Acayucan, six of the freed Guatemalans were recaptured in Tlaxcala state, hundreds of miles away. They told authorities they were on their way to a Zeta cartel training camp in the northern Mexican state of San Luis Potosí.

On May 19, at least three Guatemalans were among a group of eight gunmen who attacked Mexican marines patrolling near San Carlos, a town hundreds of miles north of Guatemala and just 80 miles south of the Texas border.

In Guatemala last year, police found a Zetas training camp with an arsenal of assault rifles and a stash of 500 grenades. Investigators say they believe dozens of recruits were being taught how to ambush police patrols.

Another Zetas weapon stash found near Guatemala City included 3,800 bullets and 560 grenades with markings indicating they had come from the Guatemalan military.

"There's been so much focus on the U.S.-Mexico border that people forget about the back door," said Fred Burton, vice president of Stratfor, an Austin-based global intelligence firm.

In March, Guatemalan authorities arrested the national police chief on charges of leaking information to the Zetas. In April, the chief of anti-drug operations in Guatemala's Peten region was arrested on similar charges.

"Entire regions of Guatemala are now essentially under the control of (drug-trafficking organizations), the most visible of which is the Mexican group known as the 'Zetas,' " a U.S. State Department report said in March.

The Zetas are a gang that broke off from the once-powerful Gulf cartel and now control most of the drug routes through eastern Mexico. But other gangs are consolidating their power in Central America, too.

On April 27, the U.S. Treasury Department froze the assets of Waldemar Lorenzana Lima of Guatemala and his family, saying they were working with Ismael "El Mayo" Zambada and Joaquin "Chapo" Guzmán, leaders of Mexico's Sinaloa cartel. The Sinaloa cartel controls routes through western Mexico.

The Mexican traffickers are also strengthening their grip on Honduras, Nicaragua and El Salvador, the U.S. State Department says.

In December, Honduran drug czar Julian González warned publicly about the growing presence of the Zetas, the Sinaloa cartel and La Familia Michoacana. He was gunned down soon afterward.

The Mexican presence reflects a major change in the way drugs are smuggled, said Mauricio Cárdenas, a Latin America expert at the Brookings Institution, a Washington, D.C., think tank.

Until the early 2000s, Colombian producers moved most of their cocaine through the Caribbean, and they controlled the entire route. But better aerial radar and an increased naval presence have forced drug shipments to go through Central America and Mexico.

That has increased the importance of the Mexican cartels, Cárdenas said. They are now moving quickly to take over the entire route, co-opting Central American gang members and using them as foot soldiers for the Mexican drug lords.

In Guatemala, street gangs that once used homemade weapons are now wielding assault rifles provided by the Mexican cartels, Mack said.

"The Mexican cartels are not just about crossing the U.S. border - they're about developing a multinational operation," Cárdenas said.